1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a method and an apparatus for recognizing characters, and more particularly, to a method and an apparatus for recognizing characters using a camera.
2. Description of the Related Art
As electronic technology has developed, portable terminals, such as mobile communication terminals, Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs), and portable game devices, have been incorporated with various functions in addition to their one or two exclusive functions. For example, in addition to a device required for a communication function, mobile communication terminals may also include a digital camera or a music file reproducing device, so as to provide the user with a photographing function or a music reproducing function. Further, such added devices are linked with other applications, so as to provide various functions. For example, portable terminals including a camera may also provide a character recognition function using a still image when linked with a character recognition application.
Generally, a portable terminal including a camera generates and stores a still image for character recognition, and a character recognition application then reads the stored still image so as to perform character recognition. The recognized result can be used in another application. Specifically, character recognition may be used to omit complicated processes, such as character key input by the user. Character recognition may also be used to input a character that cannot be input through the keys included in the portable terminal, or to input characters of which the user is not aware.
However, the conventional character recognition method fails to rapidly recognize consecutive words in real time because the user presses a shutter to take a picture of a character, obtains a still image from the photographed result, and then performs character recognition processing. In this respect, if there are many characters to be recognized, a method for efficiently and rapidly performing the character recognition and providing the recognition result is needed.